Glitches in Gamechanger

If the year-old pilot programme on cash transfers in Kotkasim, Rajasthan...a block of 25,000 households is anything to go by, the scheme that the UPA reckons will be a “gamechanger” could be undone by non-payment of cash or payment delays. Across the block, most residents said they had either received no money for one year, or at best just one of four installments.
A ground-level assessment of this project — whereby beneficiaries would get money in their accounts rather than subsidized goods — is instructional in many ways. In Kotkasim, a block in Rajasthan’s Alwar district, the numbers tell a revealing story.
Kerosene sales here have plummeted by over 70%. The reason for this isn’t clear. District collector Ashutosh Pednekar says it only shows widespread leakage. But residents of Kotkasim’s five panchayats say it’s persistent delays in the subsidy money reaching them that has made buying kerosene expensive.
“We use firewood to cook, and candles when electricity goes,” says Dharam Pal, a tailor from Bilahedi village, whose bank passbook shows he hasn’t received a single rupee in subsidy yet.